This week was such an eventful week.
Learnt so much, and most of all, got closer to the people I love.
Striping'12 on Monday was one of the key events of this week. No, actually, this year.
To those who are unaware, Striping is a formal ceremony we have in Guides to induct selected Guides into their new positions for the year ahead and it's when the graduating batch of Guides officially step down.
Striping has always been an emotional occasion for me, and this year was no different. In fact, this year is probably going to be the one that I remember the most. Last year, I was thoroughly surprised with the position I was given - that of a Quarter Mistress - but I guess I can say quite confidently that I've done my job as a QM pretty well this past year and I'm so glad to be passing the position on. Personally, I thought it felt really good putting on the stripes to the next batch of Guides taking over our positions - it felt like we were growing up and well, that's a milestone.
Congrats, new QMs! (:
Gwendolyn, Stella and Vanessa, good luck on your journey and make it a great one!
To be honest, I never did expect to be transferred out of my Patrol and I never did expect to get the position of Patrol Leader due to my various commitments and was okay with that because I wanted to let my batchmates take on leadership roles because they do deserve it.
Well, it was a surprise that I got what I never expected.
When they called my name as a second coy Patrol Leader, I was definitely unprepared and didn't even know what patrol I was going to be PL for. But as it slowly sunk in, I feel really fortunate to be given this opportunity to step up as my last year as a Guide in 2013. 02Ixora, thank you for welcoming me in and I'll do my best to make you guys love Guides like I do.
And 03Mynah (Cheryl not pictured!),
Thank you for being so nice and welcoming to me in my first three years as a Guide from a recruit all the way till now. It's definitely difficult to leave this patrol but I'm sure you'll be in good hands of your new PL, Nicole!
Thank you Rain, Chunhui and Cheryl for being such wonderful 03Mynah Patrol Leaders and guiding me along under your beautiful wings. I hope to take the spirit you guys have imparted to me to my new patrol (:
After Striping, it was Farewell performances.
Our batch has a reputation (or so we think) for being the batch that is always the least prepared when it comes to such performances but this year, being the batch that is stepping up and taking over the CCA, we decided that we needed to have more substance to thank the seniors for everything they have done for us and also to show the junior "hey you guys are in good hands, don't worry!" Therefore, we started planning our performance pretty early and stayed back pretty often after Guides sessions to practice it.
Extremely proud of how everything turned out, the speech at the start and the dance was close to perfect (': It's really surreal to see how my batch has grown and how we're really starting to take this seriously (whoops, perhaps a tad late, but still did nevertheless).
Thank you Batch'12 for being such wonderful wonderful seniors,
13atch, let's go and make Guides'13 a beautiful CCA and be wonderful seniors.
Let's support our newly elected Company Leaders, Minyie, Mae and Ailica because they definitely deserve it and I'm sure they have so much they want to do and will lead Guides to greater heights, together with us.
T'was an emotional and teary Striping'12, yet heartwarming and beautiful all the same.
That aside, as you guys would have known from my previous post, I was rather busy this week, having to help out at my uncle's wake till really late at night and by the time I got home it was usually later than 11pm and I would be really tired from doing so much and would crash without doing any work at all.
The Lord of the Flies play I went for on Thursday night was definitely a great breather amidst all the lethargy I was feeling although it added on to me staying up late as the play was from 8pm to 10pm and by the time I got home, it was also extremely late.
After House Capts meeting and PB GM, I went for dinner with Phionna, Shermaine and Nat at Plaza Sing before making our way with Swan, who joined us later to the DBS Arts Centre to catch the the play. None of us really knew how to get there so we relied extremely heavily on Google Maps, which was actually rather trustworthy and brought us to the right place so that was great.
Waiting insanely long for the bus-we'd-thought-would-never-come but eventually came.
Getting a lil' lost, looking a lil' drunk
We studied "Lord of the Flies" by William Golding during Literature in the first semester and it's one of the books which I thoroughly enjoyed as it really shows the other side of human nature - the inner salvage within all of us and I thought I could relate pretty well with the protagonist, Ralph, of which I based my Literature AA on which I was quite happy with. So, this play was something I was really looking forward to throughout the entire week.
In the centre, outside the theatre!
This play adaptation is by 'the young co.' which is a division of The Singapore Repertory Theatre, probably the youth wing or something like that. The set was simple and I really liked the rawness of the entire play - there were no microphones and all that tech-y stuff, just brilliant acting and a simple set. I personally thought that the actors were really amazing, their acting skills are top notch. I especially liked Andrew Marko's portrayal of Piggy, it's probably the most accurate one and he acts really naturally. I personally thought Simon's character and Ralph's character were a little bit off but perhaps they wanted to give Golding's story a little twist. The acting was extremely good though.
Nat, Phion and myself with the simple looking set that served it's function really well.
Although the actors did a wonderful job, I kind of felt that the way they presented the entire story was a little choppy and not very accurate to what Golding was trying to put across. To be honest, if I had never read the book, I would probably just have a vague idea of what was really going on throughout the entire duration of the play but I would thoroughly enjoy the action and drama. The theme of savagery and human nature was not very clear to the audience, and to me it was a bit like they were just trying to go through the storyline without much thought to the themes related to the plot.
Still really enjoyed myself, great job everyone behind the staging of this play! (:
After the play ended, the actors were outside mingling and we took the opportunity for a photograph with Ethan Chia, the actor who played Ralph!
Managed to get one with Andrew Marko, the actor who played Piggy too! (:
Thursday was a goooooood day (':
My life is getting crazier and crazier every day oh gosh please let me survive